I will glory in His victory

Psalm 35

1 Fight those who fight me, O Lord;

attack those who are attacking me.

2 Take up shield and armor

and rise up to help me.

3 Draw the sword and bar the way against those who pursue me;

say to my soul, "I am your salvation."

4 Let those who seek after my life be shamed and humbled;

let those who plot my ruin fall back and be dismayed.

5 Let them be like chaff before the wind,

and let the angel of the Lord drive them away.

6 Let their way be dark and slippery,

and let the angel of the Lord pursue them.

7 For they have secretly spread a net for me without a cause;

without a cause they have dug a pit to take me alive.

8 Let ruin come upon them unawares;

let them be caught in the net they hid;

let them fall into the pit they dug.

9 Then I will be joyful in the Lord;

I will glory in his victory.

10 My very bones will say, "Lord, who is like you?

You deliver the poor from those who are too strong for them,

the poor and needy from those who rob them."

11 Malicious witnesses rise up against me;

they charge me with matters I know nothing about.

12 They pay me evil in exchange for good;

my soul is full of despair.

13 But when they were sick I dressed in sack-cloth

and humbled myself by fasting.

14 I prayed with my whole heart,

as one would for a friend or a brother;

I behaved like one who mourns for his mother,

bowed down and grieving.

15 But when I stumbled, they were glad and gathered together;

they gathered against me;

strangers whom I did not know tore me to pieces and would not stop.

16 They put me to the test and mocked me;

they gnashed at me with their teeth.

17 O Lord, how long will you look on?

rescue me from the roaring beasts,

and my life from the young lions.

18 I will give you thanks in the great congregation;

I will praise you in the mighty throng.

19 Do not let my treacherous foes rejoice over me,

nor let those who hate me without a cause wink at each other.

20 For they do not plan for peace,

but invent deceitful schemes against the quiet in the land.

21 They opened their mouths at me and said,

"Aha! we saw it with our own eyes."

22 You saw it, O Lord ; do not be silent;

O Lord, be not far from me.

23 Awake, arise, to my cause!

to my defense, my God and my Lord !

24 Give me justice, O Lord my God,

according to your righteousness;

do not let them triumph over me.

25 Do not let them say in their hearts,

"Aha! just what we want!"

Do not let them say, "We have swallowed him up."

26 Let all who rejoice at my ruin be ashamed and disgraced;

let those who boast against me be clothed with dismay and shame.

27 Let those who favor my cause sing out with joy and be glad;

let them say always, "Great is the Lord,

who desires the prosperity of his servant."

28 And my tongue shall be talking of your righteousness

and of your praise all the day long.

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever.  Amen.

I do not have any enemies.  No one is plotting my death or overthrow, no one is even trying to get my job.  I go about utterly unthreatened by those around me.  I am not a king.  I am not even wealthy or influential.  I’m not very well known, and while I can’t say that I’m particularly popular among those who do know me, I also can’t honestly say that I’m particularly unpopular.  I am just a man without notoriety one way or another.  This can make it hard for me to relate to David sometimes.

This psalm gives me pause, particularly as I will often pray the psalms thinking of the “enemies” as those particular temptations or besetting sins that plague me however many times I repent, which I certainly do not believe is inappropriate.  But tonight I can’t help but think of those enemies that David wrote of as real enemies, as people out for his destruction.  Those who hated his righteousness and his prosperity.  And I am moved by his words.

David was repeatedly pursued by those who wanted him dead.  He had Saul in the early days, he had Philistine kings, he eventually had his own son and some of his old and trusted advisors working against him and trying to kill him, just to name a few.  This man knew what it was to have enemies.  And lest we forget, he also knew what it was to conquer his enemies.  He repeatedly defeated his enemies, killing those who sought to kill him or to shame God or the people of Israel.  Even when he was old he was reckoned a mighty warrior.  And he was a king.  Not just a king, but the king anointed by God to lead his people.  He had every right to rain down vengeance on his enemies.  And then we read this psalm (and many others like it).

David does not call on God to support him in his battle.  He does not ask God to strengthen him to take vengeance.  He does not seek favor in a campaign against his opponents.  He looks around at the enemies surrounding him and asks God to act.  Sure, he has some ideas about how he’d like God to act, but ultimately he only cries out to God to save him.  The first thing that David says he will do comes in verse 9.  “Then I will be joyful in the Lord; I will glory in his victory.”  David cries out for God to act, and all he intends to do is celebrate what God has done.  When we look at David’s response to the various attempts on his life, we get an even clearer picture.  He spent a lot of time in prayer, as indicated by his psalms.  He also spent a lot of time running away.

As I mentioned, I do not have any personal enemies.  But sometimes I get cut off in traffic, or a customer is demeaning, or someone on the internet will have the audacity to hold an opinion that I disagree with.  In my head, in my very sheltered world, these people become enemies to me.  And I must admit, I have difficulty being very gracious.  I will all too often find some way to take vengeance, whether it is making some sharp comment or simply insulting them to anyone who will listen.  I can only assume, then, that my inclination would be the same if I ever encountered a real enemy.  It seems unlikely that my response to an actual threat on my well-being would be to ask God to act while I continue to accept and endure enmity.

But David also takes it one step farther in this psalm.  Not only is he willing to endure the hatred of his enemies, waiting for God to act on his behalf while he flees the danger; he contrasts his actions with his enemies’ actions in verses 11-16.  His enemies delighted in his misfortune and even actively sought it.  But when they were sick he humbled himself and fasted on their behalf.  He actively sought their good, treating them as if they were his brothers.

I am reminded of the words of our Lord, as I am certain anyone reading this must be.  “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.”  Treat them like your brothers.  Desire their good.  Don’t pray back-handed prayers that they might come to realize that you were right all along.  Don’t be a jerk under the pretense of “speaking the truth in love”.  Genuinely love your enemies, and sincerely pray for the good of those who persecute you.

The natural retort to that might easily be that David repeatedly prayed for the ruin and the shame of his enemies.  Honestly, I’m not sure how I would respond to that unless it were simply to say that sometimes that’s the only thing you can pray for.  Sure, I might also say that those who sought David’s life were seeking the destruction of God’s anointed.  I might say that we would be justified to pray for the shame and the destruction of those who seek to destroy the name of Christ or his body, the Church.  But I think it is truer to say that David was so distraught and felt so betrayed by those he had loved that he wrote this psalm from a place of torment.  And yet, he did not take matters into his own hands even then.  He left it to God to avenge.

I will remind the reader that, as I have made clear, I am not a bishop and do not hold any authority.  But I believe I am on safe ground when I say that God understands when we do not have the emotional capacity to pray for the prospering of those who would destroy us, if that were possible.  All the same, our high calling in Christ is to love our enemies.  And the ministry he has entrusted to us is one of reconciliation, not revenge.  So may we pray for the good of our enemies.  And when we cannot, Lord grant us the comfort of the Holy Spirit and the grace to pray “Thy will be done.”  Amen.